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The NSA also had a tap on the Yemeni safe house where the attackers were calling to coordinate. The hijackers even stayed in Laurel, Maryland, from which you c

• mirimir 11y ago
  So did the NSA know what the attackers were going to do? I find it very hard to imagine that the NSA and/or CIA would have let the attacks happen, even to protect key assets and methods. Maybe they had compromised some Mossad communication channel. Or maybe they had a double agent. But what would have been worth the risk to DC and NYC?
  • toyg 11y ago
    More likely, they had taps but did not know what they were talking about. It was widely reported that, pre-9/11, Arabic translators were scarce in most Western intelligence services including the US, since their traditional focus were Russian, Eastern-European languages, and Chinese. You just need basic informal codes for most logistic purposes (which would be mostly "I've done this, I've done that" to confirm timings and prepare the next steps, rather than "I will hijack a plane and crash it into NYC" which would have been agreed beforehand) to make it very difficult for people who might not know all the intricacies and slang of regional Arabic varieties. So the NSA might have known these people were learning to fly and maybe even preparing a hijack, but until 9/11 this was not dramatic -- if and when the hijack happened, they would have been expected to fly to Cuba or something and then dealt with. Pre-9/11, airplane hijacks had become rare since their '80s and '70s heydays, maybe there was some complacency (as in "yeah these guys will never manage it, and even if they do, we'll likely get most passengers back safely anyway, let them play"). Or at least that's what a sharp Occam's razor would suggest.
    • mirimir 11y ago
      OK, that makes sense. And maybe the NSA and CIA weren't talking, either.
    • dorfsmay 11y ago
      Old style hijack had become rare because police forces around the world made sure that you couldn't come out a winner, you typically get killed. Hijacker are at a disadvantage: limited resources, stuck in a small space easy to surround. The fact that the 9/11 highjackers had planned to die as part of the hijack was a game changer.
      • matwood 11y ago
        Exactly. A 9/11 style attack is also a single time event. Now that passengers know the outcome, they simply will not let it happen again. The only possible method would be to turn an existing pilot into a suicide killer.
        • adrianN 11y ago
          The reinforced doors they introduced after 9/11 make this strategy particularly good. The passengers can't do anything if the pilot decides that he has a death wish.
          • DuskStar 11y ago
            An example of such would be the Germanwings Flight 9525 crash from May 2015, where the copilot locked the cockpit door after the pilot left for a bathroom break and then flew into a mountain. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanwings_Flight_9525 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanwings_Flight_9525
          • matwood 11y ago
            If the pilot has been compromised there is not much that can be done regardless of flight door strength.
    • jsprogrammer 11y ago
  • avs733 11y ago
    Very much in the opinion space here... To an extent, as with all big data systems, massive collection of data has both opportunities and risks. The risk in overcollection (e.g., the NSA type programs) is that you collect so much damn information that you are either behind in analyzing it or flat out never get there [1-2]. Combine that with (as others have noted) the lack of translators and you get what you got [3]. The old maxim* that not all data is information (DIKW) heavily applies here [4]. This whole phenomenon becomes especially problematic when you are spending all that time energy and money largely trying to predict 'black swan' events using what has happened before as what to look for in the future (e.g., the TSA as a whole or the NSA still focusing on cold war languages pre-9/11 [3]). [1] http://www.zdnet.com/article/nsa-whistleblower-overwhelmed-with-data-ineffective/ http://www.zdnet.com/article/nsa-whistleblower-overwhelmed-w... [2] http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/world/how-the-nsa-tried-to-collect-less/518/ http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/world/how-the-nsa-trie... [3] http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/aug/31/lack-of-translators-still-hampers-intelligence/?page=all http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/aug/31/lack-of-tran... [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIKW_Pyramid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIKW_Pyramid Edit: *fixed typo of maximum to maxim
  • matwood 11y ago
    I agree that it is extremely unlikely they let it happen. I think if all the documents are ever declassified it will be a case study in the breakdown of communications in a large organization. There was office politics (FBI vs. NSA vs. CIA), no overall coordination, and plain incompetence to name a few things that were wrong. We see this all the time in large companies now, the difference is that rarely do people die as a consequence. Maybe the NASA Challenger accident is a comparable organizational breakdown.
    • avs733 11y ago
      >I think if all the documents are ever declassified it will be a case study in the breakdown of communications in a large organization. I have always been curious about this as an organizational phenomenon. What percentage of documents are classified for actual security reasons as opposed to things like embarrassing the country or allies, covering up misconduct or outright illegal conduct, or just as the default reaction. Study would be impossible/impractical even with access, but it sure would be interesting.
• mirimir 11y ago
  This one?[0] > Indeed, some of the C.I.A.’s best information about Al Qaeda came from the F.B.I. In 1998, F.B.I. investigators found an essential clue—a phone number in Yemen that functioned as a virtual switchboard for the terror network. The bombers in East Africa called that number before and after the attacks; so did Osama bin Laden. The number belonged to a jihadi named Ahmed al-Hada. By combing through the records of all the calls made to and from that number, F.B.I. investigators constructed a map of Al Qaeda’s global organization. The phone line was monitored as soon as it was discovered. But the C.I.A., as the primary organization for gathering foreign intelligence, had jurisdiction over conversations on the Hada phone, and did not provide the F.B.I. with the information it was getting about Al Qaeda’s plans. So was the NSA also monitoring the Hada phone? Or maybe providing technical support for the CIA? [0] http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/07/10/the-agent http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/07/10/the-agent